Laura Nicholls

Laura Nicholls was born in Kitchener in 1978 and has lived in Waterloo all her life. She took swimming lessons at the local YMCA as a preschooler, and in 1983 joined the Region of Waterloo Swim Club. She swam and competed for ROW until 2003, and then continued her swimming career with the Pickering Swim Club from 2003 until her retirement in 2005.

Over the course of her 22 years in the sport of competitive swimming, Nicholls accomplished many goals, won many awards and travelled the world in pursuit of excellence. As a young swimmer with the Region of Waterloo Swim Club, she began to turn heads when she started setting club records in the eight and under age group in several events. She continued breaking club records in all age categories through the club’s top age group of 15 and over. By the time she ended her swimming career, she had set Ontario Records in all the sprint freestyle events – 50, 100 and 200-metre, both Short Course and Long Course; and Canadian Records in the Short Course 50 and 200-metre freestyle and the Long Course 50 and 100-metre freestyle.

As a member of the Canadian Senior National Swim Team from 1996 through 2005, Nicholls was one of the country’s fastest freestyle sprinters. She was the first woman in Canadian history to break the 56-second mark in the Long Course 100-metre freestyle. She won a total of 31 individual National Championships, and is a two-time Olympian. At the age of 17 she competed in the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, USA, finishing 29th in the 50 freestyle. At the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, Australia she and her teammates finished sixth in the 4×100 metre medley relay and seventh in the 4×100-metre freestyle relay. In individual events she finished 13th in the 100-metre freestyle and 23rd in the 200-metre freestyle.

Other memorable swims include two relay bronze medals at the Commonwealth Games, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in 1998; three gold medals, one silver medal and one bronze medal during the Pan American Games, Winnipeg in 1999; one relay bronze medal at the Commonwealth Games, Manchester, England in 2002. The final Canadian Records she set were the Long Course 50-metre freestyle in Toronto, July 2004 and the Short Course 50-metre freestyle in Calgary, November 2004.

Nicholl’s subsequent career choice has allowed her to give back to the swimming community as a coach of up-and-coming age group swimmers.